Residents confront contractors

TWO DAYS after residents of Greenvale Park, La Horquetta, asked the Housing Development Corporation (HDC) for money to fix their homes following catastrophic flooding, a handful accosted contractors hired to do the job demanding they be employed.

At a town meeting Thursday, residents asked to fix their own homes and not for HDC to do so. Yesterday, according to an HDC response to the incident, contractors were stopped from doing their work when 15 people, some from Greenvale and some from neighbouring La Horquetta, demanded to be considered for employment. The main grievance raised by them was that the contractors were “outsiders.”

In keeping with a Cabinet decision for HDC to do home repairs on the affected homes, HDC began hiring small contractors to repair the units. Those repair works include the replacement of kitchen cupboards and doors, re-tiling (where necessary), and the repair of plumbing and electrical work.

In response to the residents’ demands, HDC said: “The HDC rejects these tactics and wishes to underscore that it has no objection to the use of residents as part of the repair and rehabilitation programme. In fact, the HDC encouraged contractors who did not reside in the area, to employ (once possible) residents from the area.

Further, the HDC also wishes to advise that qualified and interested contractors/individuals who reside in the area and meet the criteria, will be considered. The HDC intends to complete all repair and rehabilitation work by the middle of December.”

HDC managing director Brent Lyons told Sunday Newsday that he planned to tell residents they could apply for contracts and be hired by contractors at the town meeting. However, he opted not to after hearing the concerns raised by residents who wanted HDC to provide homeowners with money to do the repairs themselves.

When Sunday Newsday visited Greenvale yesterday there was a slight semblance of normalcy. Rachael Garrick, head of the interim community group, said she was unaware of the tussle between contractors and some residents. She added that, since last week, HDC officials had been going around in the three phases and evaluating the damages that needed to be repaired.

“Right now residents are considering seeking legal counsel. We’re not going to sue or anything, we just want to know what our options are.” Garrick said many residents did no trust the workmanship of the HDC and preferred to do the repairs themselves.

She added that if HDC was serious about getting the repairs done by Christmas then they needed to move faster.

She felt that her Saturday was wasted as no HDC official visited her home to make an assessment, a view shared by some of her fellow residents. Lyons said the assessment would be done sporadically and not on a phase basis.

Residents were also concerned about the value of their properties following the flooding. Garrick said residents were considering pooling their own resources to have a private valuator assess their property as they had little trust in the HDC. The residents, she said, wanted to know what would become of their monthly payments as the floods had severely damaged their homes.

Lyons, in response, said that in a “normal world” a natural disaster would not affect the mortgage payment. He added that he would hire more than one valuator to appease the residents and would begin that process as early as tomorrow. Lyons said all HDC tenants had insurance with their mortgage or embedded in their rent for those with rental agreements.

The onus, he said, was on the individual to insure their belongings as some financial institutions may do so with their mortgage.

Some 500 homes were destroyed following the flooding which was described as national disaster. After the flooding, politicians on both sides of the divide sought to separate themselves from the construction of the housing development.

Documents seen by Sunday Newsday revealed that, in 2005, Town and Country gave permission to develop the land and work began in 2007. In 2008, the Water and Sewerage Authority (WASA) gave “outline approval” along with the fire department.

On June 26, 2009, Town and Country division wrote to the Housing Development Corporation (HDC) a “Notice of Refusal” on the grounds that the area was a floodplain of the Caroni River and that no development should take place there.

On October 27, 2011, HDC wrote to Town and Country telling them they had surveyed the area and made some suggestions that would mitigate flooding which included retention ponds, an embankment and installing pumps.

On November 17, 2014 Town and Country granted approval to HDC to continue the project on the condition that the suggestions to mitigate flooding would be implemented.

The initial project was five phases but phases four and five, which up to 2014 were not yet developed, were completely abandoned. Phases one and two were completed in 2014 and the third phase was finished in 2015.

Distribution took place from 2014 to 2016. The three phases were completed at a cost of $336 million which included the cost of retention ponds, pumps and embankments. Phases one and two were constructed by Motilal Ramhit and Sons Contracting Limited while phase three was done by Trinity Housing.

A hydrological report was ordered after the flooding by Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley  “to determine why Greenvale was so heavily impacted and to determine what, if anything, can be done in terms of physical works to interfere with the drainage system there to, if not eliminate, but to ameliorate and bring greater comfort to those persons who live in that area.”